Please
share the attached petition with residents of Westmoreland and all bordering
counties. We ask each of you to help us
by sharing the petition with your email lists and any group with which you are
affiliated. As stated in the petition, Westmoreland County cannot meet air
standards for several criteria. Many areas of Westmoreland County are already
listed as EPA non-attainment areas for ozone and particulate matter 2.5, so the
county does not have the capacity to handle additional emissions that will
contribute to the burden of ozone in the area as well as health impacts. According to the American Lung
Association, every county in the Pittsburgh region except for Westmoreland County
had fewer bad air days for ozone and daily particle pollution compared with the
previous report. Westmoreland County was the only county to score a failing grade for particulate matter.

The
Tenaska gas plant will add tons of pollution to already deteriorated air and
dispose of wastewater into the Youghiogheny River. Westmoreland County already has a higher incidence of
disease than other counties in United States. Pollution won’t stop at the South Huntingdon Township
border; it will travel to the surrounding townships and counties.

*** WMCG Group MeetingWe usually meet the second Wednesday of every month at 7:30 PM in Greensburg. Email Jan for directions. All are very welcome to attend.

***Ligonier Township Supervisors Meetings-February 10, 7:00
pm

and February 24, 4:30 pm

***Ligonier Twp. Hearing on the Ordinance-February 17, 7:30

***Ligonier Twp. Hearing with stenographer-March 26,

6:00 pm

We
are trying to determine at what point we may most need mass support and will
get that information out. Penn Trafford may be in the same position.

Frack News

Due
to the activity in Ligonier Township , I am getting out the Updates less
frequently. They are therefore longer- but with many townships working on the
same issues, I wanted to share the information so we all have access to what
each of us are doing. Jan

***Fracking Opponents Pack Ligonier Township Meeting

“Though
a new zoning ordinance and map regulating Marcellus shale drilling in Ligonier
Township haven't been completed, residents turned out in force to weigh in on
the issue at a supervisors meeting this week.

More
than 100 people packed into the township municipal room to voice their concerns
about how gas drilling will be represented in the new zoning ordinance, most of
them opposing it. Fifty signed up to speak; some held up signs with
anti-drilling messages, such as “Don't frack us.”

“This
is our community,” said Stephanie Verna of Laughlintown. “I'm a resident of
this township, and I think that you have a duty to all of us to preserve our
natural resources, protect the value of our property and homes, protect our
roads and infrastructure, and provide adequate public safety.”

Danny
Verna of Laughlintown said as a Boy Scout, he was taught to leave no trace on
the environment, and “fracking certainly doesn't follow this basic principle.”

Jennifer
Gourley said fracking was done 4,000 feet from her home's well, and her water
has been contaminated. She showed a jar containing her well water, which was
grey and cloudy. She said she now has health issues, including shaking,
stumbling and slurred speech.

“Frack
zones never go away,” said resident Jan Milburn. “They remain industrial. They
will be fracked and re-fracked for years, with condensate tanks, dehydrators,
valves and wells, all producing toxic air pollution that this entire valley is
going to breathe. Then come compressor stations and pipelines.

“Ligonier Valley is special and has
special needs,” she said. “We are a recreation, tourist area with high-quality
streams, special topography and many water wells.”

The township received a letter from
resident Adam Cogan stating that he supports drilling.

A
time restriction in the township's public comment policy, which limits each
person's time to three minutes and limits the total period to 45 minutes, upset
residents who did not get to speak. Some yelled, “We demand to be heard,” as
the board tried to proceed.

When
the board left for an executive session, some in the audience chanted, “You
work for us.”

Police
Chief Mike Matrunics asked the crowd to allow the board to continue its
meeting. Solicitor Michael Korns and manager Terry Carcella returned to the
room to restate the public comment policy and explain that the zoning ordinance
and map are not finished.”

***Middlesex Fight Continues

Attorney Wants Testimony Ignored

MIDDLESEX
TWP — Four hours of testimony by the only
witness at a zoning hearing attended by more than 100 people may all have been
for naught.

That
is because the facilitator of the hearing is considering a request to strike
the witness' testimony.

The
third lengthy session of the hearing for a challenge to a gas and oil amendment
to the township's zoning ordinance — passed by township supervisors in August —
was held at the township fire hall.

Four township residents plus the
Philadelphia-based environmental groups the Clean
Air Council and the Delaware Riverkeeper Network are challenging the zoning
amendment because it allows unconventional gas drilling in much of Middlesex.

Attorneys
from the township, Rex Energy and Mark
West Energy Partners are supporting the amendment at the hearings.

The
challenge caused a stoppage of work on the five Rex Energy gas wells at the Bob
and Kim Geyer farm on Denny Road. A group of Mars School District parents have
protested the wells because they say shale gas drilling would pose a health and
safety hazard to the students in the nearby schools.

Jordan
Yeager, the attorney for the challengers, called as a witness David Carpenter,
the director of the Institute for Health and Environment at the University of
Albany. The
Harvard-educated Carpenter is a professor in public health sciences at the
university and listed dozens of accomplishments before being accepted by the
zoning board as an expert witness on public health.

Under
Yeager's questioning, Carpenter
testified that drilling operations can be associated with cancers, cognitive
decline and respiratory illnesses in those exposed to an unconventional gas
well site up to 10 miles away. Citing his own research and various studies,
Carpenter said children are particularly susceptible to the negative health
effects.

“This industry is causing
significant contamination of nearby residents, and that concern is particularly
focused on children, whether they are in their residences or their schools,”
Carpenter said.

But
during cross-examination, Rex Energy attorney Kevin Barley attempted to
dismantle Carpenter's testimony by questioning reports Carpenter cited in his
written comments to the zoning board.

While
Barley elicited an admission from Carpenter that he had never visited a well
site or toured a natural gas compressor station, Carpenter steadfastly
maintained that his purpose at the hearing was to give opinions as a public
health expert.

Barley
also reported, and Carpenter confirmed, that his testimony in other hearings in
courts and elsewhere has been thrown out because of flawed methodology used by
him.

Carpenter
confirmed that his testimony on various subjects concerning public health has
been stricken from court proceedings in the past, but that more often it was
accepted.

Barley
then questioned Carpenter on his methods regarding his assertions on the
dangers of gas wells.

“I move to strike (Carpenter's) expert
testimony as unreliable,” Barley told Mike Gallagher, the solicitor for the
zoning hearing board and the facilitator of the hearing.

Township
solicitor Mike Hnath and Christopher Nestor, the attorney for Mark West Energy
Partners, which has gas pipelines in the township, agreed with Barley regarding
the request to strike Carpenter's testimony.

Yeager
countered that Carpenter is recognized by many health organizations, who rely
on him for advice and analysis on public health matters. Yeager said Carpenter
has testified in dozens of cases, but Barley only focused on two cases where
there existed a difference of opinion on his testimony.

“Those
two cases do not form a basis for striking his very credible testimony today,”
Yeager said.

He
said Carpenter on Monday night testified more than once that additional
research is needed regarding shale gas drilling.

“There
is absolutely no basis for the motion (to strike his testimony,)” Yeager said.

Because
four hours of testimony and cross-examination had passed, Gallagher adjourned
the hearing until Tuesday.

“We'll
take it under advisement,” Gallagher said of the request to strike Carpenter's
testimony.

After
the hearing, Bob Geyer had no comment.

Parent
group leader Amy Nassif said Carpenter's testimony included claims of adverse
health effects from shale gas drilling that the parent group had unsuccessfully
tried to present to Adams and Middlesex supervisors more than a year ago.

“I'm
glad they were able to hear it this time,” Nassif said.

The
hearing was to resume at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday at the Middlesex fire hall, when
Gallagher was to give his decision regarding the request to strike Carpenter's
testimony.

Faced
with an energy company's interest in drilling near assisted-living centers,
Penn Township commissioners have expanded the buffer zone for well operations
from 600 feet to 1,000 feet away from an adjacent property line.

In
addition to unanimously approving the change, commissioners said they might be
willing to further expand the setback condition, perhaps up to 1,320 feet,
which is one-fourth of a mile.

Officials
approved the change in their pending zoning ordinance just days after learning
that Apex Energy submitted an application for an unconventional gas well on an
89-acre property near Walton and Ader roads, close to Export.

Though
township officials said they are
rejecting Apex's application as incomplete because it lacked a
health-and-safety impact report and site-security plan, among other things,
commissioners said they want to act to increase the setback requirement to add
some protection for residents in areas where drillers are proposing sites,
including in the Level Green neighborhood.

“If
we're going to be prudent, let's be prudent,” said Commissioner Larry Harrison,
who lives in Level Green.

Ted
Geibel, who lives in the Walton Crossings housing plan near the Quest property,
said he was disappointed to learn about the possibility of drilling there.

“Those
people (at the personal-care centers) are going to be awake 24 hours a day
because of the light, and I can't imagine living under those conditions at the
home,” he said.

Over
the last few months, residents from Level Green and neighboring Trafford
Borough often have pressed Penn Township commissioners for a greater setback
and answers to more than 20 questions about the pending ordinance.

Some
also have asked officials to publicize if they would benefit financially from
drilling operations in the township. Among
the five commissioners, Jeff Shula
has leases – with Huntley & Huntley Inc. – for oil and gas rights. “

Update posted by Alyson: Update on Penn Twp: Last night Penn Twp's
solicitor Mlaker was back at the commissioners' meeting as were a large number
of those supporting drilling interests. Penn
Twp commissioners overthrew last week's change for setbacks of 1000 ft and
returned the setback to 600 ft. This means that Penn Twp is more likely to
approve the Deutsch well pad along Murrysville border and 700 ft from
Murrysville homes. And the Quest well pad next to the William Penn Care
facility in the Delmont area would also be very close to a well pad.

***3 Million
Gallon Spill

“Three
million gallons of brine, a salty, toxic byproduct of oil and natural gas
production—also known as fracking wastewater—spilled from a leaking pipe in
western North Dakota. State officials say it’s the worst spill of its kind
since the fracking boom began in the state.

The
spill was reported 17 days ago when Operator Summit Midstream Partners found a
toxic leak of salty drilling waste from a pipeline in the heart of the Bakken
oil boom.

Officials
say there’s no immediate threat to human health but as Marketplace’s Scott Tong
reports yesterday, there could be trouble ahead. He interviews Duke geochemist Avner Vengosh who has sampled frack
wastewater and has found that “North Dakota’s is 10 times saltier than the
ocean, that endangers aquatic life and trees, and it has ammonium and
radioactive elements.”

Tong
also interviewed Hannah Wiseman, law professor at Florida State, who says the
disposal of fracking wastewater is underregulated.

“A typical well can spit about 1,000 gallons
a day,” says Tong. “Some of the water is recycled back into fracking, stored in
pits or used to de-ice roads. It’s also injected deep underground, which has
been known to cause earthquakes.”

Wiseman
shares that fracking wastewater issues also exist in Ohio, Oklahoma and Texas.

***Protesters at
Wolf’s Inauguration Call for Fracking Ban

From Allegheny Sierra Club

Using
the recent ban on fracking in New York as an example, about 250 people marched
and called for a similar ban at the Inauguration ceremony for Gov. Tom Wolf.
Organized in part by Pennsylvanians Against Fracking, a number of protesters
entered the formal ceremony and eight were taken into custody after causing a
disturbance. The anti-fracking community will now have to wait and see how
strongly Gov. Wolf protects state lands from fracking, strengthens regulations,
and for what purposes he uses the promised severance tax.

*** South Strabane
Drilling Ordinance

“Supervisors
are reviewing changes to the township’s rules on drilling

“I
think we can see the heaviness of this problem’s development,” Keisling said. “The job for the supervisors is not
making wealth for people … it’s to protect the welfare of the citizens here and
worry about the land values. Hopefully we can make it work.”

Max
Junker, a lawyer representing Columbia Midstream Group that wants to construct a “dehydration and separation
facility” on 220 acres of agricultural land

“We’ve
made no bones about it … that at some point we are looking to put compressor
station (there),” Junker said.

Not
everyone thinks such regulation is a bad thing. Don Lambert, chairman of the
township’s zoning board, said he thinks the ordinance should restrict these
auxiliary uses to industrial areas as currently written.

Members
of Peters Township council and planning commission met Nov. 18 to discuss how
to update their zoning ordinances to allow natural gas drilling in feasible
areas. As council weighs options ahead of a January public hearing, there was a
consensus on at least one thing: council should remove the Mineral Extraction
Overlay Districts, which place industrial zoning within residential areas.

“We can’t have the MEODs anymore. Since the
Act 13 ruling, you can’t have industrial operations going on in a residential
area,” manager Michael Silvestri said.

Silvestri
presented at the joint meeting several options for consideration, including
re-zoning agricultural or the least densely populated areas with different
guidelines, amending ordinances to place environmental regulation requirements
on any applicant, as well as creating entirely new industrial districts in
outlying areas of the township.

“This
map shows what’s feasible just based on the 1,000 feet setback criteria,”
Silvestri said, “and these areas have parcels over 40 acres that have access to
state roads.” The map isolated areas along East McMurray Road, on the border
with Union Township, along Venetia Road, as well as parcels near the border of
Cecil Township.

“We’re
a lot more dense than the rest of the county, with 1,000 residents per square
mile, so it’s going to be difficult. We need to get input from the public to
develop a rational, fair and environmentally sound plan to protect the township
from inevitable lawsuits,” he said. Silvestri said he’s not pushing for
drilling in the township, but that there needs to be a “reasonable means” for
interested parties to apply for permits to extract resources in the township,
which is according to the Pennsylvania Municipalities Planning Code.

“The
issue is not just any particular avenue’s legal hurdles, but also getting
residents agreeing (to future easements) from developers and gas companies so
they can pipeline it out of the township,” solicitor John Smith said.

Councilman
David Ball said whatever language is used in future ordinances shouldn’t be too
specific.

“We have to stop talking about zoning just
to gas drilling... it’s going to get us in legal trouble if anyone subpoenas
these slides with ‘gas drilling’ all over them. We have to look to provide
(zoning) for industrial usage at large, because if someone comes in saying they
want to put in a garbage dump and we tell them they can’t because it’s already
zoned for a specific reason, we’re going to have a constitutional issue on our
hands,” Ball said.

Regulations
put upon conditional use applicants – like drilling companies – cannot be too
specific, either. When asked if there could be provisions preventing open-air
waste water retention ponds, Smith said they couldn’t enforce it.

“We
can’t put that burden on operators under current law. We can’t tell them how to
do business,” he said.

Council
has yet to schedule a specific date for a public hearing on the issue.

“Saying
they were concerned about comments received during a public hearing last week,
Peters council voted unanimously to form a special group to help determine if
gas well drilling should be allowed in the township, and, if so, where.

“I think we need more
information. I don’t know what the health hazards are,” said Councilman Frank Arcuri,
who agreed with other council members to delay further action regarding a
revamped ordinance council had planned to pass next month.

The
township in 2011 passed a gas drilling ordinance that set aside an overlay
district where drilling could occur on properties of more than 40 acres. But
the drilling landscape changed with a 2013 state Supreme Court decision that
gave municipalities more leeway to control where drilling takes place. As a
result of the complicated ruling, township officials felt their ordinance
wouldn't pass legal muster in its current form.

Council
planned to replace the former ordinance with a proposed one that called for
drilling to be a conditional use in light industrial areas, but a public
hearing that drew more than 100 people last week produced testimony that
concerned council.

Speakers from throughout Washington County
told council members that even though the township may pass stringent
requirements for drilling companies, there was no guarantee the companies would
follow or acknowledge the rules.

“They will ignore your ordinances and do
what they want to do," said JoAnne Wagner of Mount Pleasant Township, who
said a drilling company in her neighborhood built a facility without a permit
and didn’t even notify township officials, who discovered what happened after
construction was complete.

Council
President David Ball proposed creating a working group comprised of council
members, planning commission members and experts who could gather data from
witnesses and make recommendations to council. He didn’t rule out a ban on
drilling.

”I
don’t believe it’s a given that we have to provide for drilling,“ Mr. Ball
said.

The
proposal for the working group was approved, and Mr. Ball was named to the new
group along with Councilwoman Monica Merrell.

Whatever
their decision, it’s important to be informed about the issues, solicitor John
Smith said.

”To
ward off any potential claims, you have to prove the process was well thought
out,“ he said.

“…At
the heart of the issue is whether gas drilling can take place in the township,
and at the same time whether Peters can meet a number of constitutional issues
and state laws that pertain to drilling, he said.

“A
major issue that council must address is can the township develop a rational
and legal method of designating properties or areas of the township that can be
developed for mineral extraction (gas drilling)?” said township manager Michael
Silvestri. “The township’s comprehensive plan does not specifically identify
areas for gas drilling and would need to be revised to do so.”

Peters
Council will hold a public hearing Monday in council chambers to discuss and
gather public input on gas drilling. There are no gas wells in the township,
but there are horizontal wells in adjacent municipalities whose drilling
activity goes underneath sections of Peters’ perimeters. Plus, gas companies – namely EQT – have been
acquiring leases from Peters’ property owners in the event that drilling is
eventually allowed.

“Since Act 13, signed into law by outgoing
Gov. Tom Corbett, you can’t have industrial operations, like drilling, going on
in a residential area,” he said.

In
August, Peters passed a municipal curative amendment, which gives it a
six-month time frame to review and analyze ordinances to determine their
validity. It also gives the township the opportunity to make changes, if
necessary.”

From the Peters
Towshp Ordinance

Alyson
Holt: Peters ordinance is out. :
"Another HUGE change in Peters'
ordinance is that all drilling is limited to its rather small light industrial
zone (one estimate is that it's about 150 acres total) and parcels that are at
least 5 acres. They eliminated their overlay entirely (on John Smith's
legal recommendation).

Peters
township just eliminated their overlay distrist

“The
applicant shall demonstrate that the drill site operations will not violate the citizens of Peters Township’s right to clean air
and pure water as set forth in Art. 1 Sec. 27 of the Pennsylvania Constitution.
(The Environmental Rights Amendment). The applicant will

have the initial burden to demonstrate that its
operations will not affect the health, safety or welfare of the citizens of
Peters Township or any other potentially affected landowner. The application
submittal shall include reports from qualified Environmental individuals
attesting that the proposed location will not negatively impact the Township
residents’ Environmental Rights and will include air modeling and
hydrogeological studies as potential pathways that a spill or release of fluid
may follow."

L. Drip pans must be placed in any
location, under equipment, that has the potential to leak.

*
Fracking well pads and compressor stations are allowed only in the "light
industrial" zone.

*
750 ft setback from "protected structures".

*
They also put in this wording regarding setbacks: " The Township reserves
the right to increase any setback based on physical characteristics of the site
and evidence received at a hearing necessitating an increase in the minimum
setback, including but not limited to topography, wind conditions, air modeling
studies, woodlands, hydrogeological studies, and distance from structures,
parks, schools, and residential neighborhoods."

*
"Upon review of the application, Council may in its discretion require air
modeling and monitoring of emissions coming off of impoundments."

*
Pipeline wording is included in the ordinance. "In addition, the
application shall include the proposed pipeline route from the oil and gas
drill site to the transmission line and how fluids will be brought to and from
the site."

There
are other interesting items as well.

***Peters Twp
Zoning by Bob Donnan

“Our
Peters Township had creating an overlay district where drilling would have been
permitted on contiguous parcels of 40 acres or more. 15 of those parcels were
identified in our township, but with our township being zoned primarily
Residential, the overlay no longer fit after the court ruling.

While
a group of our citizens were not able to get a CELDF community rights (Fracking
Ban) voted in during an election, we were able to ward off Chesapeake Energy’s
effort to lease nearly 700 acres of public land in our township which included
our parks and school properties.

Our township has 150 acres of land zoned
Light Industrial which seems like the obvious place to put drilling. However, some of our township leaders fear
that only having that much land put aside for drilling would draw an industry
or mineral rights owner lawsuit, calling it a ‘takings.’ On the other hand,
with newly reaffirmed environmental rights for all citizens of the
Commonwealth, it is just as likely a citizen could sue the township if their
rights to “clean air and pure water” are violated. So they could get sued
either way, a big part of what the discussion is about in this new video.

This
latest YouTube is a combination of two meetings: The Jan 15, 2015 Planning
Commission Meeting (second on the video) where you hear from solicitor Brendan
O’Donnell (sitting in for John Smith) and the Jan 26, 2015 Council Meeting
where you hear from solicitor John Smith. In between these two meetings was the Jan 19, 2014 Public
Hearing on this same topic.

“One
of the residents I am in contact with, whose house is 500-feet from the ongoing
fracking on the Trax Farms drilling pad, got us worried the other night when he
emailed that he had called an ambulance for his wife. Here is his account of
the incident the following day:

“On
her way back from my father in laws who lives next door, she was overcome with
a mixture of diesel fumes and a burnt plastic odor. This caused her to begin a
persistent cough. I smelled the same odor which caused my eyes to water. This
episode lasted approx 20 to 30 minutes before it disappeared. Given the fact
that we are due east of this pad site and the contour of the land, more often
than not, the wind carries this unknown white cloud right towards our home. I
truly believe last night was the perfect conditions for this cloud to stay
close to the ground while being blown towards our home. I noticed this cloud on
88 last night on my way home.

This
was not the first time this has happened but from our experience, this was one
of the worst events. I have pictures and
videos of the cloud, DB reading and our air quality monitor, again, one of many
pieces of evidence.

This is absolutely an unbelievable
experience! I had way more expectation of our federal, state and local
government to serve and protect the people they are to serve!”

***Casey Votes to
Close Halliburton Loophole

“Some
good news, Senator Casey did hear us and voted for the Amendment to close the
Halliburton Loophole, Amendment 48 sponsored by Senator Gillibrand (NY). This important vote has created a
record of Senators voting for … or against … protecting people and their health
as it relates to oil and gas operations.
For the first time there is now a
list of those in favor of protecting people on the issue of the Halliburton
loophole.

“In Bradford County,
Chesapeake just bought out a family whose home & property they contaminated
by their fracking operations.

In
the Sunday Review (1/18/15)
Chesapeake bought out another home they contaminated, the Leighton's, for
$125,000. What a good neighbor they are-- this
home with acreage was at least four times that value before Chesapeake ruined
their water supply and then paid the owners what is was worth after they ruined
it. Who's Next to be sold to
Chesapeake Land Development Co. of Oklahoma City?”

Posted
on Triple Divide Facebook Page

***Ethane Pipeline
Blast Creates Fireball

FOLLANSBEE
W VA - A 20-inch diameter ATEX Express pipeline ethane pipeline, operated by Houston-based Enterprise Products
Partners, ruptured in Brooke County, leading to a wall of fire visible for
several miles

Jackson
said the blast caused no injuries or property damage for local landowners, but
said two families were evacuated as a precautionary measure.

Because
of the snow covered roads, a Follansbee Fire Department truck became stuck
while the driver tried to respond to the fire. Officials with the West Virginia
Division of Highways, Brooke County Sheriff's Department and local fire
departments blocked the roadways leading to the fire.

"They
turned the gas off, but it's my understanding that it takes a while to burn
out," Jackson said late Monday as the flames continued flaring. "We
really would just like to know what caused it so something like this doesn't
happen again."

The
company began shipping ethane southward in January 2014. Along its route to
Mont Belvieu, Texas, the pipeline collects ethane from four natural gas
processing plants in the Marcellus and Utica shale regions:

--
the MarkWest Energy facilities in Houston, Pa. and in Cadiz;

--
the Blue Racer Natrium facility in Marshall County; and

--
the M3 Midstream Utica East Ohio facility in Scio.

***Fracking Poisons
The Earth’s Fresh Water Supplies.

“Lena
Headley lives in Fayette County, Pennsylvania. She and her husband bought a
small farm for their semi-retirement with the mineral rights but not the oil
and gas rights. Over the last seven
years 5 gas wells and a transmission pipeline have been put on their land. The
effect has been devastating: Pollution of land and air together with
destruction of fruit trees and the burning of 10 acres of ground by the gas
drillers. Gas wells leak and a spring
200 feet from her house is so rich with gas it can be set on fire.

Visits
to the family doctor have become common. Her 5 year old son Adam suffers from
crippling stomach pains. Lena has said that she wants her story to act as
warning to ordinary people about the dangers of fracking.

In
an interview in 2012 she said;” And why? All because of an uncaring, dirty
industry, driven by greed, selling their souls, leaving our health,
environment, and rights behind as waste. When will this nightmare end ???”.

In
December, a team of scientists from the University of Missouri published a
study in the Journal of Endocrinology
that revealed that over 700 different chemicals are used by the fracking
industry. Their study focused upon a dozen fracking chemicals which had
contaminated water supplies in Colorado which is home to over 10,000 fracking
gas wells. They took samples of
contaminated river water from areas close to fracking sites and found that
these chemicals disrupt the normal functioning of the endocrine system and can
lead to cancer, infertility and birth defects.

How
can drinking poisoned water be safe? Numerous
scientific studies have concluded that fracking poisons the local water supply
by adding carcinogens and radioactive materials. According to Dr.Sandra
Stenigraber, Distinguished Scholar in Residence at Ithaca College and Science
Advisor to Breast Cancer Action, there have been over 1,000 different cases of
water contamination near fracking sites.

In
many areas across America fracking has
led to high levels of arsenic and other toxic heavy metals in ground water near
drilling sites. Researchers from University of Texas last year found levels of
arsenic 18 times higher than in areas without fracking. The Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA) has found elevated levels of arsenic in Wyoming and
Pennsylvania. Meanwhile, scientists at Duke University have found high levels
of methane, propane and ethane in ground water samples near fracking sites in
northern Pennsylvania.

As
if that wasn’t bad enough in some areas fracking waste water is highly
radioactive. A U.S. Geological Survey report found waste water from gas wells in Pennsylvania and New York state to be
3,609 times more radioactive than the federal limit for drinking water.

Meanwhile,
Scientists at Duke University have found
levels of radium 200 times above normal or background levels in the
Pennsylvania creek that flows into the Allegheny River . In New York state scientists from the Department of Environmental
Conservation analysed 13 samples of waste water and found,” levels of radium-226, a derivative of uranium, as high as 267 times
the limit safe for discharge into the environment and thousands of times the
limit safe for people to drink.”

EPA scientists are worried
about the threat to public health from the huge amounts of fracking waste
water. Sewage treatment plants are incapable of removing radioactive materials
from waste water which is then discharged into rivers from which drinking water
is taken.

On
average only 30-50% of the fracking fluid is recovered the rest is left in the
ground. In some areas waste water is
left in open air pits to evaporate into the atmosphere. Harmful volatile
organic compounds are released into the air creating acid rain and ground level
ozone.

Numerous
studies have shown how fracking chemicals can contaminate water supplies. There
have been transport spills before and after gas drilling, the fracturing
process itself, disposal of waste water and failure of gas well casings and
seepage from abandoned gas wells. Chemicals fluids from gas fracking can
migrate underground to contaminate water tables.

To
compound this environmental pollution there is the problem of water shortages
caused by fracking. Each fracking well uses huge amounts of water requiring 2
to 4 million gallons of water. The EPA has estimated that the 35,000 fracking
wells in America consume between 70 and 140 billion gallons of water each year.

A recent study by Ceres
reveals that 47% of all oil and gas wells in the US are in regions with high or
extremely high water stress. More than 55% of all US wells are in areas
experiencing drought. Thirty six per cent of all wells are in regions
experiencing ground water depletion.

The
fracking industry’s reliance on huge amounts of water is placing unsustainable
demands on many regions which are expected to experience 20 per cent or higher
growth in population. To compound matters there has been a systematic
over-exploitation of 40 major US aquifers. Major fracking activity and depleted
aquifers overlap in many regions.

In
many water stressed areas such as Texas it is creating major problems for
ordinary people. There is water rationing for 15 million people and 30 small
towns are threatened with running out of water completely because of the
insatiable demands of the fracking industry.

Besides
this, the water demands of the fracking industry create yet another problem for
local communities: wear and tear on roads and the air pollution caused by
hundreds of trucks bringing water to the site and then taking waste water away.
The average fracking well requires over 400 trucks to deliver water and take
away waste water.

On
top of this, is the associated rise in deaths and injuries caused by road
accidents from the huge increase in traffic on roads. For example, in Pennslyvania heavy truck crashes have increased by an
average 9% a year. Some of these crashes have spilled fracking waste water into
surface water.

There
is of course an economic burden for local areas associated with this increase
in truck crashes. In Pennsylvania a
typical truck crash has an estimated economic cost of $216, 229 relating to
deaths, injuries and property damage. This has added an estimated $28 million
burden on to the overstretched budgets of heavily fracked counties.

The
fracking industry in America resembles one vast ponzi scheme that is as
reckless as it is criminal. Let’s take the example of Wyoming which has thousands of fracking
wells. It has recently come to light how
companies that once operated fracking wells have disappeared and have abandoned
the wells they made huge profits from. Apparently, over 1,200 fracking wells
have been abandoned in Wyoming with state officials saying there may be
thousands more to come.

Many
of the companies that once operated these fracking wells are seeking bankruptcy
and unable to pay the cost of cleaning up the land they leased. Many farmers
are complaining to state officials that their land has been left in a toxic
state. Take for example the case of State senator John J.Hines who is seeking
public money to clean up the 40 fracking wells abandoned on his land by Patriot
Resource Company. It appears that Wyoming state will have to pay for the clean
up costs for the 1,200 abandoned wells with potentially thousands more to come.

Max
Keiser, a financial commentator, has called fracking suicide economics. As he
points out, many fracking companies sign contracts with farmers to lease their
land knowing full well that they won’t be spending any money to clean up the
toxic mess they will have created.

Keiser
calls fracking a ”12 to 36 month scam” by energy companies out to make a 5%
return on their investment. Companies borrow money at zero per cent to pay for
fracking rigs, make huge profits during the life of the fracking well then once
its exhausted declare bankruptcy to avoid any clean up costs. Leaving tax
payers on the hook for millions. I wonder where we’ve seen that kind of scam
before?

Not
surprisingly, there is a growing movement of ordinary people against this form
of suicide capitalism. Over 400 counties in America have passed resolutions
banning fracking operations from land in their areas. In Pennsylvania local
people have delivered a 100,000 strong petition to Governor Corbett calling for
a halt to fracking operations in that state. Last year 650,000 people sent
messages to the Obama administration calling for a ban on fracking on public
lands.

As
the fracking industry spreads its destructive tentacles across the globe
ordinary people must fight back against the big oil and gas companies that
would poison millions of people and destroy local environments. All in the
pursuit of a quick buck.

I’ll
leave the last word to Sandra Steingraber, ”At what point does preliminary
evidence of harm become definitive evidence of harm? When someone says, “We
were not aware of the dangers of these chemicals back then,” whom do they mean
by we? .”

"Out
in Bradford and Susquehanna counties considered by many to be the heart of the
Pennsylvania's shale gas production, more controversy was brewing for the
Governor. Many landowners were claiming
that Chesapeake Energy, the state's largest shale gas producer, was short
changing and unfairly deducting operating costs from their royalty payments
to those who lease their land. A sudden decline in the amounts that Chesapeake
was paying in royalties came about at the same time the company found itself in
difficult financial conditions struggling with billions in short and long term
debt. [...]

After
more than 7 years of Pennsylvania's interstate highways, bridges and overpasses
being heavily used by out of state shale gas companies trucking heavy
equipment, water tankers, fracking chemical trucks and natural gas storage
tankers in and out of state, Gov. Corbett signed into a law a record increase
in state gasoline taxes in a major Transportation Bill. (So you and I paid at
the pump to repair the roads that the gas industry wrecked. How do pro-fracking
people rationalize this?) Overnight Pennsylvania had the 5th highest gasoline
taxes in the country. A multi-year gasoline tax bill, the Corbett
Administration claimed the gasoline taxes were at the wholesale level, not
raised by the Administration at the pump. Thousands were angered by Corbett
raising taxes after promising not to do so. Claims it was on the wholesale
level and therefore not a tax on Pennsylvanians at the pump rang hollow and at
the same time out of state shale gas companies continued not to pay taxes on
record amounts of natural gas being pumped and hauled out of the state."

“For
decades, the petrochemical industry spent millions on science seeking to
minimize the dangers of benzene, a carcinogen tied to leukemia and other
cancers. A 2004 National Cancer Institute study suggested there’s no safe
threshold for people working with the chemical.

Our
review of some 20,000 pages of internal records reveals the petrochemical
industry went to great lengths to rebut studies showing harmful effects of
benzene in low doses.

Bloated
and bed-ridden, his skin browned by blood transfusions, John Thompson succumbed
to leukemia on November 11, 2009. Thompson never figured the chemical could do
him harm. Not when it stung his hands or turned his skin chalky white. Not even
when it made him faint. But after being diagnosed with a rare form of leukemia
in 2006, relatives say, he came to believe his exposure to benzene had amounted
to a death sentence. Oil and chemical companies knew about the hazard, Thompson
felt, but said nothing to him and countless other workers.

“They
put poison on his skin and in the air he breathed,” said Chase Bowers,
Thompson’s nephew. “He died because of it.”

Thompson
died before a lawsuit filed by his family against benzene suppliers could play
out in court, where science linking the chemical to cancer could be put on
display. Over the past 10 years, however, scores of other lawsuits, most filed
by sick and dying workers like Thompson, have
uncovered tens of thousands of pages of previously secret documents detailing
the petrochemical industry’s campaign to undercut that science.

Internal
memorandums, emails, letters and meeting minutes obtained by the Center for
Public Integrity over the past year suggest that America’s oil and chemical
titans, coordinated by their trade association, the American Petroleum
Institute, spent at least $36 million on
research “designed to protect member company interests,” as one 2000 API
summary put it. Many of the documents
chronicle an unparalleled effort by five major petrochemical companies to
finance benzene research in Shanghai, China, where the pollutant persists in
workplaces. Others attest to the industry’s longstanding interest in such
“concerns” as childhood leukemia.

A toxicological review of benzene produced for the American
Petroleum Institute in 1948. It is says that in general the chemical is
considered so potent that there is no safe exposure level. An undated litigation
defense guide from a senior attorney with Shell Oil Company. He cautions
colleagues to avoid "inadvertent disclosure" of benzene documents.

“The
conspiracy exists, and the conspiracy involves hiding the true hazards of
benzene at low doses,” said Robert Black, a Houston lawyer who represents
plaintiffs in toxic tort cases. Since 2004, while handling dozens of lawsuits
filed on behalf of workers sickened by leukemia, lymphoma and other diseases
associated with benzene,

.
“You’re still seeing elevated risks of
leukemias and lymphomas among occupational groups exposed to benzene,” said
Peter Infante, a former director of the office that reviews health standards at
the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, who has studied the
pollutant for 40 years, “as well as
populations being polluted from these benzene sources.”

Melanie Marty, of the California Office
of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment, said regulatory limits are now
“getting lower and lower for [benzene’s] non-cancer risks” — dizziness, rapid
heart rate, neurological problems, anemia — and not just its carcinogenic
effects.

Experts say the petrochemical industry has
bankrolled more research — at greater cost — than anyone but Big Tobacco, which
coined the phrase “manufacturing doubt.”

“The
results don’t support the presumption of bias,” Irons said, explaining that, so
far, the research has confirmed benzene’s association with AML as well as myelodysplastic
syndrome, or MDS, a cancer of the bone marrow.

The
National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), part of the
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, recommends that workers limit their
benzene exposure to an average of 0.1 ppm during a shift.

After
11 quakes in the last two days – with one registering at a 3.6 – Irving, Texas’
sudden onset tremor problem might be the fracking industry’s nightmare.

There’s
a monster lurking under Texas, beneath the sand and oil and cowboy bones, and
it’s getting a little restless after a 15 million year nap. Shaking things up
in the city of Irving, just slightly west of Dallas, where no less than ten
earthquakes yesterday and today bring the total tremors to 26 since October in
that town alone. Over 100 quakes have been registered in the North Texas region
since 2008, a staggering uptick from just a single one prior that year.

The
Balcones Fault Zone divides the Lone Star State in half, loosely following the
route of Interstate 35 and passing under Fort Worth, Waco, Austin, and San
Antonio. And it’s not just a huge amount of human populations that sit on top
of it. There are also thousands of fracking wells boring down in to the earth’s
crust, pumping millions of gallons of water down with the direct intent of
breaking apart what lay beneath.

...And
it’s not just Texas. Poland Township in Ohio had 77 earthquakes happen last
March that researchers have definitively linked to fracking, in a paper
published just days ago. And British Columbia has the oil addiction shakes,
too.

Worth
noting: This cluster of quakes is taking place almost directly beneath the
Exxon-Mobile world headquarters, which is located in Irving. The company’s CEO,
Rex Tillerson, joined a lawsuit last year to prevent a water tower used in the
fracking process from being built near his 83-acre horse ranch in a swanky
suburban Dallas enclave. Whether these are considered ironic or karmic quakes –
that’s up to you. But for the repeatedly shaken up people of North Texas, it’s
not very funny anymore.

“Researchers
find alarming levels of these new contaminants in wastewater released into
Pennsylvania and West Virginia streams

Two
hazardous chemicals never before known as oil and gas industry pollutants—ammonium and iodide—are being released and
spilled into Pennsylvania and West Virginia waterways from the booming
energy operations of the Marcellus shale, a new study shows.

The toxic substances, which can have a
devastating impact on fish, ecosystems, and potentially, human health, are
extracted from geological formations along with natural gas and oil during both
hydraulic fracturing and conventional drilling operations, said Duke
University scientists in a study published in the journal Environmental
Science & Technology.

The
chemicals then are making their way into streams and rivers, both accidentally
and through deliberate release from treatment plants that were never designed
to handle these contaminants, the researchers said.

The
findings have major implications for whether stronger regulations are needed to
curb water pollution from fracking and other oil and gas industry operations.
Over the years, the industry has faced questions about unsafe well design that
allows methane to seep into drinking water, and about lubricants and other
chemicals it adds to frack water. Duke
researchers have conducted a number of studies on these problems.

Now
add to the list of concerns ammonium and iodide—two naturally occurring,
dangerous chemicals that are essentially unregulated in oil and gas wastewater.

"We
are releasing this wastewater into the environment and it is causing direct
contamination and human health risks," said study co-author Avner Vengosh,
professor of water quality and geochemistry at Duke's Nicholas School of the
Environment. "It should be regulated and it should be stopped. That's not
even science; it's common sense."

Industry sources did not respond immediately to
word of the new study.

When
dissolved in water, ammonium can turn to ammonia, highly toxic to aquatic life.
The Duke team found ammonium levels in
streams and rivers from energy industry wastewater outflows at levels 50 times
higher than the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's water-quality threshold.
Under a loophole created by Congress in a 2005 energy law, fracking wastewater
isn't regulated under the U.S. Safe Drinking Water Act.

Meanwhile,
the Duke scientists found that the iodide contamination from energy operations
– while not toxic by itself – promotes the production of disinfection
byproducts when it comes in contact with the chlorine that is used to treat
most drinking water systems. Previous studies have shown that such disinfection byproducts have toxic andcarcinogenic properties, but only a few
are regulated.

"As
far as we are aware, iodide and ammonium are not regulated, nor monitored
in any of the [oil and gas] operations in the United
States," the researchers said in their paper.Terrence Collins, director of
the Institute for Green Science at Pittsburgh's Carnegie Mellon University, was
not involved in the study but said findings of iodide contamination are
particularly worrisome, especially if stream or river water is extracted
downstream for drinking water.

"Widely
practiced chemical treatments to kill pathogens are likely to cause the iodide
to become incorporated into organic matter in the drinking water, and I am
concerned that this could result in increased incidences of cancer," he
said in an email.

The recent boom in U.S. oil and gas
production has been accompanied by a surge in wastewater production. Fracked wells produce about 1 million to 2
million gallons of wastewater per well. For conventional wells, the volume is
less but the risk of contamination with ammonium and iodide is the same.
"The method doesn't matter," said Vengosh.

There
also have been wastewater spills, including seeps from illegal disposal,
leaking from surface impoundments, and truck tanker accidents. Some states even
have purposely spread the salty oil and gas wastewater on roads to suppress
dust or for de-icing.

The
estimated volume of oil and gas industry wastewater generated in the U.S. is
now more than 837 billion gallons (3.18 billion cubic meters) per year. For
comparison, that's nearly three times the volume of all the oil and gasoline
that the United States consumes each year (291 billion gallons).

The
researchers said their study adds to a growing body of evidence that government
action is needed. "There are significant environmental and ecosystem
impacts of current [oil and gas wastewater] disposal practices in the
U.S.," they wrote, "Regulatory action is needed to address these
concerns."

“Chemical
plants, coal mines, power plants, steel mills, oil refineries and even the
maple syrup industry must disclose their releases of hazardous pollutants on
the federal Toxic Release Inventory.

But
the natural gas drilling industry isn’t required to do the same, even though it
now releases more toxics into the air than any other industry except for
electricity-generating power plants, according to a coalition of environmental
and open-government organizations.

Those nine organizations filed a federal
lawsuit Wednesday seeking to compel the U.S. EPA to require drilling companies,
hydraulic fracturing contractors, and natural gas compressor stations and processing
facilities to report their emissions as other industries do.

“Due to EPA’s long inaction, the oil and gas
extraction industry remains exempt from the Toxics Release Inventory, one of
our nation’s most basic toxic reporting mechanisms,” said Adam Kron, an
attorney for one of the plaintiffs, the Environmental Integrity Project. “The
Toxic Release Inventory requires just one thing: annual reporting to the
public. This reporting is critical to health, community planning and informed
decision making. Whether to add the oil and gas extraction industry shouldn’t
even be a question at this point.”

. Drilling
industry trade groups, including the Marcellus Shale Coalition and the American
Petroleum Institute, wrote letters opposing that petition, saying most
individual drilling and production facilities don’t meet minimum chemical
reporting thresholds. They also said the petition sought to improperly
aggregate multiple oil and gas drilling facilities to meet those thresholds.

Environmental
groups viewed the inventory as a crucial tool for protecting public health and
the environment, as well as spurring innovations to reduce emissions. It required manufacturing facilities using
or processing more than 10,000 pounds of any toxic or carcinogenic chemical a
year to annually report the information about those releases into the air,
water or soil. The number of chemicals now subject to TRI reporting was
expanded over the years to more than 650.

The
EPA administrator can require additional industries to report their toxic
releases, and has. In 1997, the EPA added TRI reporting requirements to the
electric power, hazardous waste treatment, bulk petroleum terminals, and metal
and coal mining industries, but not oil and gas production, saying those
facilities were unlikely to meet the chemical emissions or 10-employee
thresholds.

Mr.
Kron said oil and gas development operations have expanded in size and scope
during the past 15 years.

“The
oil and gas drilling industry with its directional drilling and fracking and
compressor stations, wastewater impoundments and processing plants is a
different industry than it was in 1997,” he said. “It didn’t have the big
multi-well pads and the adjacent processing components. Many of its facilities
could easily meet chemical reporting thresholds now.”

The
lawsuit cited a January 2014 study by the Environmental Integrity Project that
found 400 large oil and gas extraction
facilities in six states — Pennsylvania, Colorado, Louisiana, North Dakota,
Texas and Wyoming — emitted a combined
8.5 million tons of TRI-listed chemicals annually.

"While
the oil and gas industry continues to push for expanded drilling operations off
the Atlantic coast—and receives government subsidies for it—a new report by an
ocean conservation group finds that the benefits produced by wind energy
eclipse those of fossil fuels, with far fewer risks. Many of the benefits
touted by oil and gas companies do not hold up under scrutiny, according to the
Oceana report, Offshore Energy by
the Numbers: An Economic Analysis of Offshore Drilling and Wind Energy in the
Atlantic (pdf). The industry often inflates its
job creation figures by including inaccessible resources in their calculations,
for example.[...]

`Chief
among their findings was that even a modest development of domestic offshore
wind resources would "offer benefits that cannot be matched by offshore
drilling." Twenty years of wind energy could produce as much energy as
five billion barrels of oil, the report says. On a state-by-state basis,
job creation projections increased as much as seven times more for wind energy
than offshore drilling in all seven of the states being considered for fossil
fuel extraction. In Florida, for instance, wind energy could create 28,317
lifetime jobs, while drilling would only produce 3,828. Overall, wind energy
could create 71 percent more jobs than drilling across the entire Atlantic
coast. That figure comes at least in part due to the sustainability of wind
energy—"when oil and gas runs out, so do the jobs," the report
states."

The Clean Air Council’s new gas
infrastructure map will make it easy to
see compressor stations, dehydration stations, gas processing plants, natural
gas liquid pumping stations, power plants, and pipelines in the state, You
can also report pollution issues from nearby facilities directly to regulatory
agencies—including the DEP and the U.S. Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease
Registry. The map is now available
online at: http://tinyurl.com/gasmapPA

Registered
nurse Rebecca Williams talks about the health issues she has witnessed in those
living alongside gas wells and compressor stations in Azle, Texas- the sudden
appearance of Nosebleed, headaches, rashes, respiratory infections when
fracking starts.

“The
video is about 3 minutes long. Parents in Butler approach supervisors when
fracking threatens the health and safety of their rural community. The proposed Geyer Well Pad is 1/2 mile from the Mars
District schools and even closer to homes in a nearby sub-division.

A
few excerpts:

Jordan Yeager for Delaware Riverkeepers-
“Townships cannot put the interest of one set of property owners above the
community as a whole”

Tom
Daniels-U of Penn Land Use Expert – The ordinance
allows heavy industrial use in agricultural areas permits haphazard oil and gas
development which is contrary to protection of public health safety welfare.

Dr. Ingraffea of Cornell has
pointed out that the industry can only be profitable if they achieve density.
That’s why leased regions are honeycombed with hundreds or thousands of wells.

This
video presents photo shots of Texas, Arkansas- You only need to watch the first
few minutes then jump to other sections of the video to get the gist. But
everyone should watch at least part of this.

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With
your help, we have handed out thousands of flyers on the health and
environmental effects of fracking, sponsored numerous public meetings, and
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write- Westmoreland Marcellus Citizens’ Group. The reason for this is that
we are one project of 12 at Thomas Merton. You can send your check to:
Westmoreland Marcellus Citizens’ Group, PO Box 1040, Latrobe, PA, 15650.

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can also give your donation to Lou Pochet or Jan Milburn.

--

"I would judge that anyone foolish
enough to be taken in by the television and other media advertisements put up
by the gas and oil companies deserves to be poisoned or radiated. Basically,
we’re letting them wreck the place." Former US Ambassador, Dan Simpson

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Westmoreland Marcellus

The Westmoreland Marcellus Citizens Group (WMCG) consists of citizens from Westmoreland County who are concerned about the potential impacts of deep gas well drilling in the county. On this blog you will find information about recent news articles and upcoming events.